The Fool That Loved Him
by Verdreht
Summary: Sano always was a fool. SaitoxSano One-Shot for now


Saito dragged the pen across the paper in front of him, leaving a trail of black ink across the otherwise pristinely white page. The scratches of the tip were the only sounds in the open office, long since emptied of all but a handful of occupants. Night had fallen, and they had all run home to their lives outside this place.

He had stayed behind. Truthfully, he had no reason to leave. To spend his time in one quiet building or another made no difference to him, and he was dangerously close to doing the impossible.

To his right, a neat stack of papers stood complete and resolute on his desk; to his left, only two sheets remained, awaiting the slash of his pen and the sullying of his stiff, efficient scrawl. Two more reports to file – a robbery and a murder, respectively – and he would fulfill the dream of every man on the police force, if not every man in the entirety of government employ.

Two more reports, and he would be caught up on his paperwork.

A throat cleared, nearly resulting in a blotch of ink on the page, had Saito not heard the man coming and had the good sense to lift the pen from the paper.

"Fujita, that man is here to see you again." The speaker, a man Saito only vaguely recognized from the times he'd said those same words in recent months, sounded irritated. That, more than anything, apprised Saito of whom he was speaking.

"Send him in," Saito said.

"Are you sure, sir?"

Saito's brow ticked. "Feel free to do otherwise, if you must, but I won't be responsible for the damages."

"The damages?" the recruit said. However, Saito was tired of him, and didn't favor the man with a response. Finally, and perhaps wisely, he turned back and headed for the door.

Saito only managed a few more lines before the sound of familiar footsteps reached his ears. He ignored them, keeping his eyes and his attention – the latter, insomuch as he could – on finishing the reports.

"I thought I might find you here." The voice no-doubt belonged to the same man as the hip that settled on the corner of his desk, just shy of disturbing his infuriatingly neat stack of papers.

"You thought? A novel concept for you," he remarked idly, never taking his eyes from the paper. "I'm pleased to see you're applying yourself."

"Asshole."

"And thus we're back to mindless insults."

Sanosuke folded his arms across his bare chest. "You started it," he said.

"You really are five, aren't you?" He scratched his signature – Goro Fujita's signature – across the bottom line and skillfully kept the twitch of amusement from his lips as Sanosuke scowled.

"There you go again with the insults!"

"That wasn't an insult," Saito said. "Merely an observation."

Sanosuke bristled. "That's even worse, bastard."

"You'd rather I lie to you?" Saito casually pulled another piece of paper in front of him and set to work. One more to go.

"I'd rather you stopped being such a dick and came drinking with me."

Two months ago, the request would've sounded absurd. The thought of Sanosuke Sagara showing up at his desk in the late hours of the evening with such a proposition would have either entertained him or, more likely, incensed him.

It had been an interesting two months, however. From the first afternoon the moron had burst into his office demanding to know just what the hell he was doing coming back to Tokyo and oh-by-the-way-I-thought-you-were-dead, the dynamics between them had…changed. Or, he thought, perhaps it was they who had changed. Sano certainly had, though it had taken some time to see it through his all-too-familiar coarseness and temper.

As time had progressed, though, and his encounters with the wild-haired man had grown more frequent and, to his admitted surprise, amiable, he had come to see the differences. His eyes…they had changed. Gone was the youthful innocence and ignorance to the ways of the world. But he wasn't jaded. The change hadn't left him hardened like so many others; more, awakened. And little by little, through their often chance encounters, he'd come to realize that what he'd thought the younger man lacked when he had known him before, he somehow seemed to have gained.

Except for manners. Those, it seemed, still eluded Sano.

"Oy, cockroach, I'm talking to you."

"So I see," Saito said. "The real wonder will be the day you finally _stop_."

A soft growl escaped Sano's frowning lips. The sound, deep and guttural, went straight to Saito's groin.

Again, two months ago, the reaction would've been unheard of. And again, it had been an interesting two months. There was really no explaining it, and Saito couldn't be bothered to try. Sano had always been something to admire, with his admirable strength of body and character alike and his rough, natural beauty – and that had been before years and experience had matured him into a respectable man. Saito had simply succumbed to the inevitability of it.

"So, how 'bout it, Narrow-Eyes? Drinks?"

And in typical Sano fashion, the rooster-head was completely and utterly oblivious.

"An evening of watching you drink yourself into a stupor and make a fool of yourself?" Saito said dryly. "How could I refuse?"

"Yeah, 'cause this looks like so much fun." Sano went to pick up a few papers off the stack, but Saito caught his hand before he could disturb the order.

"Must you touch everything?"

Sano met his gaze unflinchingly. "Only when it pisses you off," he said with a cheeky grin. "Now, come on." Reversing Saito's grip on his wrist so that he was holding Saito's in turn, Sano pulled him up out of his chair.

"Remove your hand before I remove it for you, moron," Saito said evenly. Even as he spoke, though, he gave his wrist a jerk to pull it free from Sano's firm, calloused grip. The man's touch left his skin tingling, but he pointedly ignored it. "I have better things to do than to feed your bad habits."

"Just keep telling yourself that."

Saito knew he was fighting a losing battle, and thinking about it, it wasn't even a battle he wanted to win. He could go out with Sano, watch the man drink, talk – he'd been surprised to find Sano was actually good conversation on almost any topic, menial or sincere – and generally enjoy the company of the man he'd reluctantly grown so fond of.

Not that he was one to show it; not that Sano would ever notice, much less reciprocate.

Or, he could stick around the empty office and finish two more rounds of mind-numbing paperwork that would have no doubt re-spawned _en masse _by the next morning, only to…what, precisely? Return to his equally empty home and accomplish little to nothing.

Both options were considerable wastes of time; only one of them sounded like it could be any measure of enjoyable.

Mind made up, Saito sighed and allowed himself to be dragged away into another night of pointless society.

And he couldn't even bring himself to be annoyed about it.

"You insufferable," he said anyway.

"Thanks."

"Do you even know what that means?"

In response, Sano just smiled that crooked smile of his. One look at it, at the way it crinkled his almond eyes and showed off rows of perfect teeth that had somehow survived years of fist fights and abuse, and there was no denying it: Sanosuke Sagara was truly a fool.

And Saito was the fool that loved him.


End file.
